Access to quality preschool, also known as early childhood education (ECE), provides children with strong foundations for future academic achievement and learning. There is evidence of the vital importance of the early childhood years from countries all over the world, but the vast majority comes from high-income countries like the United States. The lack of local research and evidence often leaves governments in low- and middle-income countries, like Rwanda, wondering whether these ECE programs will have the same effects in their countries, and how to invest in ECE appropriately.

The number of national policies supporting ECE across low and middle income countries has been increasing, due in large part to Sustainable Development Goal 4.2, which calls for all boys and girls to have access to quality early childhood development, care and preprimary education. However, investment and changes in practice have been slower to follow. This is particularly true in Sub-Saharan Africa. There, though ECE enrollment rates are starting to rise, less than half of children have access to these services and the quality of existing programs is generally poor.

Faced with this challenge in Rwanda, Save the Children used a data-driven approach to strategically advocate for greater investment in ECE. Our work highlighted local evidence about the positive impact of ECE on children’s learning and development.

Read the full article about data-driven approach to advocate for early childhood education by Caroline Dusabe, Lauren Pisani, and Frannie Noble at Save The Children.